Thursday, June 6, 2013

Marijuana Report: St. Louis Arrests Blacks For Possession 18 Times More Often Than Whites

In the city of St. Louis, black people are arrested for marijuana possession eighteen times more often than white people.

This is the according to a new report from the American Civil Liberties Union, which says that law-enforcement agencies in the U.S. waste billions of dollars on racially biased marijuana arrests. On average across the country, blacks are four times more likely than whites to face arrests despite the fact that the two races generally use marijuana at equal rates, the ACLU says.

In St. Louis, the disparity is significantly greater, according to local advocates who cite the alarming eighteen-to-one ratio.

St. Louis Metropolitan Police Chief Sam Dotson, however, argues that the data is misleading -- and emphasizes that the city does not ever engage in racial profiling.

"We do not do targeting for marijuana," Dotson tells Daily RFT. "They say there is aggressive enforcement around marijuana laws.... I fundamentally disagree with that.... We're not profiling. We're not going out and searching for individuals to stop."

"We spend a lot of time on training our officers about how not to profile," he continues, later adding, "our goal is fair treatment of all."

Then why do the numbers show such a huge disparity in the city? It depends on whom you ask.

The ACLU argues that across the country -- and especially in states and counties where the disparity between black and white arrests is unusually high -- there is clearly a racial bias. In the national report, on view below, the ACLU specifically highlights the city of St. Louis as an area with a notable problem.

In Missouri, blacks on average are more than 2.5 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than whites, the report says, but the ratio of black to white arrests in the city of St. Louis is 18.4 to 1.

"That kind of racial disparity in our policing and criminal-justice system is very damaging," Jeffrey Mittman, executive director of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri, tells Daily RFT. "There is no proof that policing and targeting marijuana possession makes us any safer."

ACLU-EM

Jeffrey Mittman.

Mittman emphasizes that this report -- an unprecedented look at local data on pot arrests across the country -- should encourage law enforcement and elected officials to acknowledge that current marijuana laws are not working and that reform is necessary.

"We have to find a fairer and smarter way to keep Americans safe," he says. "We all have to start from the basic point that the war on marijuana is a failed war.... Let's get everyone to the table, and let's have an agreement that the current solution is no solution at all."

Dotson, however, argues that there is a direct link between drug offenses and more serious crimes.

"The fact is that right now, marijuana is illegal," he says, "and there is a nexus from marijuana to other criminal activities, including violence. I don't think it's a waste of money."

If the population of St. Louis city is about half African-American, why, then, is the arrest rate for marijuana so much greater for blacks?

Dotson says that the report does not consider the breakdown of calls for services that the department gets -- as well as the breakdown of bench warrants, referring to individuals who have been arrested but have not gone to court.

He explains that individuals on bench warrants are searched, and if marijuana is recovered, those are reported as new crimes.

The numbers for bench-warrant arrests have been consistent in recent years, Dotson says, pointing out that in 2012, there were 8,532 African Americans compared to 1,320 whites. And in 2011, it was 9,317 blacks and 1,275 whites in this category.

The department has an obligation to respond to the crimes that are occurring and that the community is asking it to investigate, he says.

"If we look at the crime and found the descriptions of the suspects involved in the crime, it's going to be higher than 52 percent," Dotson says, referring to the percentage of blacks in the city. "Are we profiling them [or] are we doing really good police work and following where the leads and the clues take us?"

Continue for more from Chief Sam Dotson and for the full ACLU-EM commentary and report.